On March 21, the India International Center in New Delhi hosted a conference on "Competition and Big Tech" jointly organized by the International BRICS Competition Law and Policy Centre, the Competition Commission of India (CCI) and the CUTS Institute for Regulation and Competition (CIRC) under the aegis of CUTS International (Consumer Unity & Trust Society), the oldest Indian academic center dedicated to consumer issues.
The event focused on competition in digital markets and the regulation of large technology corporations. Antitrust agencies often do not have the tools to assess digital companies and control competition on the IT market. Conference participants will discuss new approaches to regulation of large digital platforms and present important cases from their practice. The conference also included a Meeting of the BRICS Working Group for Research on the Competition Issues in Automobile Markets.
Panel II on "Ecological Approach to Competition Law in the New Economy" presented the ecoantitrust project that the BRICS Competition Centre is developing together with the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA).
Panel III on "Ex Ante Rules and Competition Law for the Digital Economy — Indian Perspective" discussed the Indian approach to the digital economy that strives to combine ex ante rules with the competition law machinery.
The event brought together the representatives of competition authorities of BRICS countries and international organizations, scientists and leading experts in the field of antitrust law, including:
- Pradeep S Mehta, Secretary General, CUTS International;
- Ms. Jyoti Jindgar Bhanot, Secretary (I/c), Competition Commission of India;
- Jayant Sinha, Chairperson, Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance;
- Andrey Tsyganov, Deputy Head, Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS), Russia;
- Alexey Ivanov, Director, International BRICS Competition Law and Policy Centre;
- Payal Malik, Advisor to the Economic Division of the Competition Commission of India (CCI);
- Ujjwal Kumar, Associate Director, CUTS International;
- Ettore Maria Lombardi, Professor, School of Law, University of Florence;
- Elena Rovenskaya, Program Director, IIASA;
- Jia Kai, Associate Professor, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China (UESTC) (Virtual)
and others.